Clean and simple has always been my way of designing and building a site. White space is a good thing. I suggest leaving all the bells and whistles off and write quality content easy to read for your readers.

By keeping a clean site people can navigate easier and find what they need. Try not to use so many colored fonts and other distracting items. I know most people want to place ads and other relevant stuff on their site and in some cases, it is what helps make money but it is not always necessary.

For instance, take a look at longtime running Zen Habits. He made a career from this simple designed site. No ads no flashing anything. Just pure quality content and a very large following. Another example of a clean site that does pretty well is a site called Pencil Writing. Simple to move around and easy on the eyes to read. And yet another one, Nature’s Bookstore. An interesting idea. Simple design and works.

This site, Blog Building Tips is designed in a simplistic form as well. Although it does have a few more items the overall look and feel is clean and easy to get around.

So if you are starting out with a new blog or wanting to whip an existing one in shape don’t worry about adding so many moving parts. Simple is attractive on many levels.